


Painted Lady

by habenaria_radiata



Series: Putting the "Con" Back in Unconventional Romance [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Graphic Depictions of Makeup Application, Missing Scene, No Spoilers, Pampering, Pining, Pre-Time Skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:49:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22811911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/habenaria_radiata/pseuds/habenaria_radiata
Summary: Yuri insists there's only one acceptable way to repay Byleth for returning one of his belongings, but it takes more than a silver tongue to convince her of the fact.Luckily, Yuri's is practically golden.[route agnostic, no spoilers]
Relationships: Yuris Leclair | Yuri Leclerc/My Unit | Byleth
Series: Putting the "Con" Back in Unconventional Romance [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1649116
Comments: 54
Kudos: 503





	Painted Lady

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Cinereous](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinereous/profile) and [KelpieChaos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KelpieChaos/profile) for being kind enough to beta this for me.
> 
> I hope you enjoy. ♥

* * *

The brush was a long, sleek thing, wider at the top and tapering down to a delicately rounded point at the very bottom. While she wasn't exactly an expert on the world of art and the various tools of the craft, it didn't look like any paint brush she'd ever seen before. The wood was smooth to the touch and stained a dusky purple color, and the bristles were almost supernaturally soft and slightly curved along the tip. At first she'd assumed it was brand new; it didn't look like it had ever seen even a splash of paint. But upon closer inspection, the bristles had left a faint pink patina of dust on her thumb.

It was a lucky thing that Constance happened to spot her with it, or she'd have spent half the day tracking down any of her students who had ever so much as doodled in the margins of one of their assignments.

Navigating Abyss had yet to become second nature for her, but Byleth was getting better at remembering which passages weren't dead ends. Not that she minded the dead ends unduly. They tended to be packed with cats. Today she bypassed them all, cutting straight through Burrow Street and hanging a left into the Ashen Wolves' classroom.

Truth be told, even calling it a classroom lent it a little more credibility than it probably deserved. Sure, it had a chalkboard, but it also had a haphazard pile of desks and papers strewn all over the place. If it worked for them, she wasn't going to judge. Still, Byleth couldn't help but eyeball the various candles flickering merrily on the desks that had been fortunate enough to remain upright. This place was a fire hazard just waiting to happen.

"Afternoon, friend. What's the occasion?"

She jerked her head away from one of the particularly concerning desks and came face to face with the man she'd come here to see. Wordlessly, she stepped closer and pressed the brush into his pale hand. "Constance said this belonged to you."

He seemed surprised by the abruptness of the gesture, but it was soon smoothed away into something like bemused neutrality as his fingers closed around the handle. "Oh, you found it, huh? I've been looking everywhere for that. Thanks." A brief pause enveloped them, then Yuri twirled the brush with a roll of his fingers and tilted his head. "You came all the way down here just to give this to me?"

Were it anyone else standing before her, they'd likely have sounded touched by the gesture, or at the very least _appreciative_. His expression was pleasant enough, but she could practically hear the real question crouched at the back of his tongue. _Why did you really come?_

"I did," she said simply. "I don't mind. I spend most of my free days giving my students back all the things they dropped. This really isn’t outside my norm."

"Quite the do-gooder." That sweet smile sharpened into something closer to a smirk, and he twirled the brush in another lazy circle before he flipped it over his knuckles and grasped the handle. "I'll be seeing you, then--"

"I didn't know that you paint."

Yuri blinked at her, tilting back from her a fraction. One of his eyebrows arched before they both furrowed into subtle but visible confusion. "That would be because I don't. Is someone telling you stories about me? To think, I didn't even feel my ears burning."

Now it was her turn to be baffled. Byleth stared back at him without blinking. "Why do you keep a paint brush then?"

A sharp little snort left him. Yuri's glacial eyes rolled up towards the ceiling, and he pressed one of his hands to his hip. "Aha. Hilarious, friend, that joke never gets old -- oh, wow, you're being sincere." By the end of it he was staring at her, his eyes wide and his glossy lips open. He was strangely adorable when he was genuinely surprised. He looked less like a preening fox and more like a boyish cat. "This isn't a paint brush. It's a makeup brush. Specifically, an eyeshadow brush."

It was not often that Byleth felt foolish. She could count the occurrences on one hand, and most all of those times had been courtesy of Sothis’ henpecking. She certainly did now, however, something like heat needling up at the back of her neck and up to her ears. "...Oh. What do you mean _specifically_ , are there different kinds?"

Immediately, Yuri laughed at her. A lot harder than she felt it really warranted. "As a matter of fact, there are. Have you never used makeup? Ever?"

A little grumpy, Byleth shook her head and folded her arms over her middle. "That never came up, no. Not really part of my father's repertoire."

Again Yuri laughed, this time a little more subdued, but no less amused. "I see. I'll tell you what. Makeup brushes -- quality ones, anyway -- don't come cheap. So. Since you went out of your way to bring it back to me, in exchange, I'll teach you to use it. Do we have a deal?"

"Wait, what?" Byleth blurted. She shuffled back a step from him as if he might lunge straight for her unpainted face. "I- that's not necessary. I told you, it's not a big deal. I really don't mind--"

"Nonsense," he interjected. "I never leave a debt unpaid. Unless you don't _want_ to learn, in which case, I can find another form of repayment."

The way he said it made her feel strangely like an ass. Like perhaps she was insulting his hobby by dismissing it as frivolous. "I just...don't want to waste your time. That's all. As far as priorities go, looking pretty is a ways down the list for a mercenary. If you were to teach me, I don't know that I'd make much use of it."

Fortunately, he didn't seem offended. He listened to her intently, swaying from one foot to the other as he rubbed his chin. "Oh, I don't know. You could always give the enemy something nice to look at right before you run them through. Consider it community service. Not to say that you don't already make for a striking angel of death, but as you like to remind us, there's always room for improvement."

A surprised little snort of amusement burst from her before she could suppress it. No doubt that's how he saw it when she threw him into the fray. That was merited, at least. He _was_ awfully pretty to look at. Her resistance dissolved as easily as a sugar cube dunked into boiling hot tea. Byleth nodded once, a slightly hesitant incline of her head. If she was going to let him sweet-talk her into doing anything, better that it be something as harmless as this. "Alright, then. If you're sure."

"Excellent. Come along, then." A wider smirk bloomed across his lips. He lifted his hand and quirked one beckoning finger at her. If nothing else, she no longer felt like an ass, for whatever smell mercy that was. Now she felt more like a mouse being charmed into a snake's den.

She wasn't sure that was better.

Nevertheless, she followed after him, trailing after this beautiful lavender will-o-wisp deeper through the tunnels of wet stone and crumbling walls. It would be the easiest thing in the world for him to guide her through the maze of Abyss and abandon her there, but she trusted him to do right by her. In this, anyway.

Finally, after what felt like a dizzying eternity bouncing between identical halls, Yuri drew her into a side room and pressed her down onto a round stool before a mirror. Was this his bedroom? She craned her neck to take stock of it, but before she could see anything of note, cool fingers curled beneath her chin and turned her face up toward him. It jarred her so much she jerked on the stool, her spine going rigid and a sharp breath zipping between her teeth.

Yuri leaned back and lifted both his eyebrows. "Don't like to be touched?"

Byleth hesitated several seconds before she shook her head. "No. It's more that other people don't like to touch me. I guess I'm just not used to it."

He merely nodded his acknowledgement. He seemed to be concentrating hard, scrutinizing her face like an art critic in a particularly amateur gallery. It was impossible not to feel self-conscious. She'd never felt that way before. Yuri's arresting eyes traced every curve of her face, his gaze so intense she could practically feel it rake along her skin.

Evidently that much was obvious, because Yuri soon smiled sharply and stepped back from her, tapping once at the bottom of her chin. "Don't like to be looked at much either, do you? Relax, my friend. Makeup is all about enhancing what's already there. Unlike actual painters, _I_ don't get a perfectly blank canvas, and I have to know what I’m working with."

"Right. Sorry."

She wished she could rub the irritating sting from her cheeks, but it seemed to dissipate on its own when Yuri turned away from her to rummage through a fancy wooden box filled with even fancier glass bottles. He tossed one of them up and snatched it out of the air before he returned to her. The bottle he slid on the vanity at her back, then rolled the edge of his sleeve and pushed up to bare his forearm.

The entire process mystified her. She stared up into his face where he was scowling thoughtfully, bending his elbow and holding his pale arm right up beside her cheek. "Lucky, lucky. You're the same flawless shade of alabaster I am. Good. That'll make this much easier."

Yuri reached for the bottle again. Wedging his thumb against the glass, he popped the stopper, handed it to her, and poured something into his upturned palm. "What is that?"

Ignoring her for a moment, Yuri pressed his hands together, distributing the substance evenly across his palms. "This evens out your skin and helps the rest of it stay on." His hands parted with a slick sound, and he pushed them forward, spreading the strange ointment all over her face. Byleth jumped again, one of her legs almost darting right up between his thighs before she was able to wrestle the reflex back under control.

"...Sorry. It's cold."

"Remind me not to take you by surprise without some protection." Yuri scoffed, but the warm smirk that seized him did a great deal to obscure any offense he might have taken by her violent reaction. She lowered her foot back to the ground, ever so slightly sheepish, and tilted her head to allow him the room he needed to do...whatever he was doing.

To her infinite surprise, it wasn't as invasive as she had feared. It felt nice. His hands were soft and patient, his thumbs rolling along her cheeks, across the fragile skin beneath her eyes, and his fingertips swept over her forehead and temples, then down to trace her jaw. Finally, he pressed his thumb into the dip beneath her lips, smoothing out the last of it along her chin.

She could not remember the last time anyone had touched her like this. If ever. It was nerve-wracking as hell, but at the same time, this small bit of human contact was enough she wanted to cling to it like a buoy.

If Yuri was privy to any of her private thoughts, he did nothing to indicate as much. He pulled his hands away from her and grabbed a cloth smeared with faded streaks of purples and pinks, using it to clean both his hands. When he stepped back between her knees again, he had a new bottle in his grip. Unlike the previous one, the thick cream that spilled from its neck was colored the same tint as Yuri's -- and apparently her -- ghostly white skin. "This is foundation," he explained, pre-empting her question. "This covers blemishes and makes your face one nice, uniform color. I won't have to use much, which both my pockets and I are grateful for. You were blessed in the skin department. This stuff gets pricey."

"Oh."

She frowned slightly and shifted on the stool. Why was he wasting all his expensive materials to return a favor that was so trivial? By the end of it, she'd likely owe _him_ for everything he'd used on her. Yuri did not appear to be overly fussed about it, though. This time, he pressed his hand to the top of the bottle and flipped it, then righted it again to reveal a shallow dot of peach-colored cream. As soon as the bottle was returned, he dipped two of his fingers into it and used the tips to cover her face inch by painstaking inch.

He was much more thorough this go around. His delicate fingertips traced lines of the foundation across her forehead, down her temples, all along her cheeks, and even right down the bridge of her nose. Only once it was all off his palm did he make use of both his hands again, blending the liquid with his thumbs.

Her breath came thin and shallow. It wasn't as though she was vulnerable to him. He'd brought her in here with her sword still strapped to her hip and a dagger on her thigh. And yet, she felt bizarrely defenseless in the face of such focused attention. She couldn't imagine allowing anyone else to do this to her, which was absurd. She and Yuri had been acquainted a scant few months. She had no real reason to let him do something she wouldn’t even entertain to let anyone else try.

Awareness snapped back against her like a rubber band as he coaxed her head back further, and both his thumbs skated down the curves of the tender underside of her jaw. "You put it on even down there?"

"I don't _have_ to, but I prefer not to look like a clown, don't you? Trust me, when you end your foundation without covering your jawline, it’s very noticeable." Yuri regarded her with a foxy, self-assured smile and let her head drop back down right before he pushed the edge of his thumb along the sides of her nose, working the liquid into the shallow creases. "There. Look at you, cleaning up so well. So. You've really never worn makeup? No one in your dad's company did?"

She waited for his hands to come away from her again before she shook her head. "No. I didn't even know what it was before I was around nobility. It just doesn't seem practical."

"Practical?" Yet again, Yuri was laughing at her, and again, Byleth could do little more than trumpet her disapproval with a very mild frown. "Ah, yes. Of course. I ought to have guessed that you’d be utterly no-nonsense. You'd never wear something so impractical as tights," he crooned, and he reached down to pinch at the black lace of said tights and snap it against her thigh.

She almost kicked him on purpose, but managed to refrain. "You have a point," she admitted, because it was true. "Not everything has to serve a practical purpose. Just like not everything has to be transactional in nature. Right?"

That did give him pause. One side of his nose crinkled slightly, but again, he was quick to smooth it away. "Is this your way of telling me you made the trip here because you like me so very much? I'm terribly flattered, but I still won't be left to owe anyone anything. That isn’t how I operate."

Silence lapsed between them once more. Yuri busied himself with rifling through his box of things, hemming and hawing and picking up petite cases to examine each of them. "You have an...interesting color palette."

She had no idea what that meant, but it did not sound like a compliment. Eventually, Yuri planted himself between her spread knees again, an open box filled with glittering brown powder in one hand and the eyeshadow brush she'd given him in the other. "Not very adventurous of me, but I have a feeling you'd appreciate that more than something...let's say, experimental. Got to be gentle with all that untouched, virgin skin. Close your eyes."

Reluctantly, Byleth did close one of her eyes, the other still zeroed in on Yuri's face. He met her piercing stare without flinching, tilting his head back and chuckling almost sweetly. "It's good instinct not to close your eyes around me, but in this case, I'm going to have to insist. You're scrunching your other eye. I assure you, I won't do anything untoward. Not this time, anyway."

The implication of a 'next time' in his room sent her stomach twisting dangerously. She felt stupid shortly thereafter, however, tightening her jaw and berating herself for it. He was about as sincere a flirt as Sylvain. He had noble men and women alike eating out of the palm of his hand.

He didn't mean anything by it. Probably.

Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes, trying her absolute best to keep her eyelids from trembling and jumping, especially when she felt his hand come up to brace against her temple. This close to her, she could smell the fragrance that clung to his handsome uniform, something spicy and clean and masculine.

He'd been perplexed by the idea that she'd think him to be an artist, but she felt exactly like a canvas as the silky soft bristles of his brush passed over her eyelid. She could feel his knuckles brush against her cheek as he covered her skin from corner to corner, even pushing up along the crease of her eye. It was surreal to feel the pressure of him tracing the sphere of her eyeball without touching it, or even hurting her at all.

Yuri did the same to her other eye, his free hand shifting from her temple down to her chin where he turned her face at whatever angle he needed it. She didn't open her eyes until he bid for her to, and they fluttered open and blinked several times beneath the foreign weight of something new on her skin. "It feels kind of strange. Do you do this every day?"

"I do. I wouldn't leave my room without makeup any sooner than you'd waltz out of yours without clothes."

Byleth huffed at him and offered a tiny smile of her own. "I admit, it does feel nice. I can see why you wear it now."

Though, truth be told, she couldn't imagine it being half as pleasant without someone else being the one to do it. Her entire body was warm and as relaxed as if she'd spent the day in the sauna and not traipsing about a frigid underground labyrinth. Pleasure zipped beneath her flesh everywhere Yuri touched her, and she didn't realize her toes had curled so tightly against the insoles of her boots until she noticed how numb they were.

Uncurling them forcibly, she looked back up to Yuri and let out a soft puff of breath. He was so focused he was paying mind only to her individual features. The quiet that filled the space between them was a companionable one now. The only thing breaking it was the occasional flickering of the halo of candles dangling from the ceiling and the soft click of his boots on the stone where he adjusted his weight.

"Alright."

Byleth snapped to attention, sitting up a little straighter as Yuri produced a long, unfamiliar brush that was tube-shaped. "This time I need you to keep your eyes open the whole time. Look up at the ceiling. And don't fidget, or I _will_ poke you in the eye, and I _will_ decline to take responsibility for it."

"No pressure." Byleth shook her head, but she did as she was told, opening her eyes and gazing up at the ceiling.

He was absolutely right. She could feel the displaced air from the bristles before they even touched her eyelashes, and every inch of her wanted to squeeze her eyes shut and lean away from it. To Yuri's credit, he was as efficient with it as possible. The brush swept from the base of her eyelashes to the tips, following the curves and coating them in the same thick black she noticed on his own.

She blinked furiously the instant he pulled away, her eye watering and her lashes itching already. Much as she wanted to scrub at her eye, she did not imagine that Yuri would be thrilled to have her ruin all his hard work. And he still had one more eye to go.

He pressed his whole hand across her forehead and eased it back. Again she rolled her eyes toward the ceiling and tried hard not to blink as the rougher bristles spread inky black chrism all over her lashes.

"I don't know how you do this every day." Byleth shoved her head down as soon as his weight disappeared from her forehead. Her eyes watered with a vengeance, but before they could spill down her cheek, Yuri had pressed a clean white handkerchief right up beneath her eye.

"I'm not letting you streak your foundation on my watch. Chin up, you're almost done. I promise." He smirked the entire time he dabbed at her eyes, not stopping until the rheum of tears disappeared from them.

"I'm okay. You can keep going."

"Glad to hear it. I'd be disappointed if you let a bit of face paint get the better of you."

Smartass.

Yuri put everything back into the box save a tiny little square of something glossy, and he produced a brand new brush that he dipped into it. "Word of advice from a humble expert? Emphasize the eyes, or emphasize the mouth. Try to go bold with both and you'll either look like an idiot, or like you’re for sale."

"Noted."

Her head followed him as he knelt down in front of her, balancing himself on one knee. "Open your mouth."

She reared back from him, uncertainty squirming in her insides. "I already kind of felt like breeding stock. You're not going to look at my teeth, are you?"

Yuri's pale eyes rolled in a dramatic circle. "I'm not interested in your teeth. Just open your mouth."

She'd come this far. It seemed silly to quit now. Byleth obeyed, parting her lips and watching the brush close the distance between her face and it. The first smooth sweep along her bottom lip was not what she had been anticipating. She sat frozen, holding as still as she possibly could while Yuri's clever hand curled against her chin, the other guiding the brush that stroked at the shape of her lips.

"There. That wasn't so bad, was it?"

Gallingly, she found herself disappointed that he pulled away. She felt bereft, left only with the slight tingling of warmth in the wake of his touch. "No," she finally managed. "It wasn't."

Yuri extended his arms with a flourish, spreading both his hands wide and holding them there until she took them. He helped her up off the stool and spun her around by the shoulders, motioning towards the mirror. "Now you can admire your reflection and tell me what a spectacular job I did."

The person staring back at her from the mirror did not even look like her. At the start of this bizarre foray, she had not expected it to make much of a difference at all. She knew that if she wiped all the various creams and powders from Yuri's face, he'd be just as stunning as ever. The difference on her own face was so much starker. She looked like some sort of noble, not like the hardened daughter of a mercenary. She looked...pretty.

"Stunned speechless? Come now, I barely did anything. I was kidding before. You know that, right?" Yuri made a face at her, nudging her back around with one hand. "You still in there?"

"Yeah. I'm sorry. I just...you did. Do an amazing job, I mean. Thank you, Yuri."

The wink he flashed her made her feel like an embarrassing fourteen year old. "The pleasure was mine. And with that, I believe we're even. You ought to go back surface-side. You can report back to me later how many jaws you drop at the academy."

"Ha ha," she deadpanned, throwing him a flat look. "They're going to ask me who I am and what I've done with the professor."

"Only if they have no imagination." Yuri walked away from her, tugging the door open and gesturing smoothly for her to take the lead. "I'll walk you back to the monastery. If I leave you to your own devices, I have a feeling you'll never get out of here, and no one will be able to admire my handiwork."

Despite his rude teasing, Yuri did exactly that. He took her back through the maze of tunnels and canals, guiding her all the way to Burrow Street where he had the nerve to ask her if she thought she could make it the rest of the way on her own. His smug smile was as charming as it was infuriating.

She did make it back to the surface, thanks very much, and she ducked into her own room before anyone could see her with her face tarted up so beautifully.

It was impossible to unwind until she was safely on her bed, sinking down into the plush covers and pitching onto her back with a groan.

The bite of something sharp against her ass was enough to grab her attention. She whipped over onto her side and pressed her hand into the back pocket of her shorts, her fingers closing around something sleek and rectangular that she pulled free.

It was a box of brown eyeshadow.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! if you want to find me on Twitter at @rad_iata, we can yell about Yuri together


End file.
